Huntington Restaurant Transforms Dining Area to Make Face Shields

A Huntington Station restaurant owner decided to make use of his establishment’s dining room while remaining open for takeout during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Edmund Zarou, of Zaro’s Cafe, has turned the family-owned Greek and Italian eatery into a staging area to create plastic face shields for first responders. The restaurant has been able to produce several shields a day with the use of 3D printing technology and to date has made 500 copies of the protective gear.

Zarou said in an email that he recognized the need for medical supplies as the coronavirus quickly spread in the area.

“We wanted to turn a negative into a positive,” the restaurant owner said, adding he owns four 3D printers from another one of his businesses.

“When I realized I could make these shields it was a no-brainer,” he said. “We immediately shifted the empty dining room from Zaro’s Cafe into a makeshift mini face shield factory for first responders, medical workers, fire departments and EMTs [Emergency Medical Technicians] all over Long Island. We even sent a bunch to a hospital in Chicago.”

Zarou said while he continues to receive an overwhelming amount of requests for the gear, he and his family are working hard to keep up with the requests and plan to do so until the pandemic ends. 

“We are here to support the heroic health care workers as they take care of us,” he said.

The restaurant owner said the family-owned business knows about struggles and is grateful for the support they have received from the community.

“We are all about family and doing what we can to help others whenever possible,” he said. “We have been here almost 27 years and have had our own struggles the last few years. Small businesses have gotten hurt, so we appreciate our loyal regular customers as well as new ones who are still just finding out about us.”

Zaro’s Cafe is open for curbside pickup and delivery Tuesday through Saturday, 1 p.m. to
8 p.m. Those who would like to donate for Zaro’s Cafe to purchase material for more shields can do so via the mobile payment service VENMO by using the handle “ezarou” for the recipient or the digital payment network ZELLE by entering [email protected] as the receiver.